Keith Jowett's early inspirations for starting a band were watching his mother sing and play piano at the Wheatsheaf Hotel in High St. Queensbury, where they lived, with everyone singing around the piano; walking up the old wooden steps with his friend Paul Woodhead to the band room to watch the world renowned Black Dyke Mills Band practice in Queensbury on many ocassions; and also seeing the Beatles open their first professional tour at the Bradford Gaumont Theatre as bottom of the bill to star Helen Shapiro on 2 February 1963.
The Zanties were the first band formed by Keith in 1967 after watching an episode of The Outer Limits called "The Zanti Misfits" on TV. Keith and Paul had taken guitar lessons for a year prior and were ready to hit the road. |
Keith's brother John joined as drummer and brought in Peter Schofield on bass guitar.
Their first gig was for the local scout group dance and then the Queensbury Conservative Club. Though they were not lighting any fires, it was good experience.
By February 1968, they did the Conservative Club Ballroom Dance, which was a bigger venue - and more dances, clubs, and pubs followed.
Keith and John had heard about Bluesville '68 Club at the Farmer's Inn, Thornbury, Bradford and on a Sunday night in April, they were able to get tickets to see Fleetwood Mac. The bigger blues bands had heard of how appreciative this audience was and so many bands played there at a fraction of their usual fees. You could not swing a cat and Mac had a wall of Orange/MAT amplifiers and brought the house down. Peter Green, lead guitarist of Fleetwood Mac, loved the tone of Orange/MAT amplifiers. Keith and John were so impressed with the Orange equipment that, two years later, the band bought a 250 watt Orange PA system!
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By September 1968, they had a change of management when Ronnie Fairbrother and his friend David Appleyard came to a practice session and offered their services. Ronnie would manage them and David would be a front man in the band as part of the deal. Ronnie said he would get them more quality work so they agreed to it. The band would be the same lineup except David would be an up front energetic vocalist. The fit seemed to work and the highlight of 1968 was backing Rick Wayne (Mr. Universe) at the Central Library Theatre, Bradford as part of his world tour.
In 1969 the band was doing a week engagement at the Star & Garter in Leeds when an agent, Norman Thewlis, approached the band to do a lot of work with his agency. About this time, Ronnie and Dave were getting restless and decided to go their separate ways. The band signed with Norman Thewlis and were working seven days a week.
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Horton Bank Top provided the open bar with beer. Next up was a week at the prestigious Lyceum Rainbow Club, Bradford, where Jerry Lee Lewis had played, as did
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He also got the band on at Royal Air Force Menwith Hill, a military base near Harrogate, North Yorkshire. To this day, the station provides support to both the United Kingdom, the United States, and allies in communications and intelligence, with an extensive satellite ground station and missile warning system. It is regarded as the largest electronic monitoring station in the world. Midnight Hearse was very popular with the US servicemen the first time they played there and brought the house down. This secured them two more shows at the base.
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By early 1971 the band did gigs at the Kon Tiki night club, Wakefield, Low Mill Lane social club, Keighley with Brian Pool and the Tremeloes, as well as others, before departing on a tour of Wales in February.
BBC Radio One's Tony Blackburn, host of Top of the Pops, was DJ at two gigs The Midnight Hearse played at in 1973, introducing the band on both occasions.
BBC Radio One's Tony Blackburn, host of Top of the Pops, was DJ at two gigs The Midnight Hearse played at in 1973, introducing the band on both occasions.
The band continued to work and began to write their own songs.
In October 1975, Trevor's dad, Tom, mentioned that he had been a boxer in the army and had been watching Richard Dunn's progress - a heavyweight from Bradford. Having won all his recent fights, he was about to fight for the British & Commonwealth title on 4 November 1975. Tom advised that if he became champion he would only have two or three more fights before the European title, and then maybe a crack at the world title. His point was that it would move rapidly to the world title within months. He advised the band to write a song for the world title in earnest. The band members listened to the British title fight on the radio and Dunn won.
Richard was contacted and told about the song they were working on for the world title, assuming that he won the European title. He advised the band that he would sponsor them for Hughie Green's talent show "Opportunity Knocks". He wrote the letter to Hughie Green in December 1975. Norman Thewlis accompanied them to the audition. Hughie Green was on the panel (he was not always present at auditions) and liked the band enough to ask them to do a second number. This usually ensured that an act was going to be on the show! Norman told the band that a heated argument took place between Hughie Green and two of the panel. Unfortunately, they persuaded Hughie to pass. Norman told the band that they were as close as he'd ever seen to an act getting on the show.
Paul, at this point, decided to leave the band to pursue an opportunity to work with Peter Schofield, who was the original bass in the Zanties.
On 29 January 1976, the band did a week at the newly named Talk of Yorkshire club and Richard Dunn arrived for a photo session with the band on stage for the Telegraph and Argus newspaper. The following evening, the band was on the front page!
They soon completed the song for the world title and then later went down to the Royal Albert Hall in London to watch Dunn fight for the European Heavyweight Boxing Championship on 6 April 1976. He knocked out the German for the title and then everything went crazy.
Keith went to see promoter Mike Barrett at his office in the Royal Albert Hall with a tape of the world title song. Barrett liked the song and advised that he had just set the date for the Dunn - Ali fight with Don King for 24 May 1976! Keith set up appointments at five record companies in the Tin Pan Alley area of London, but they all turned the song down. |
He had one last appointment at Contemporary Music in Wimbledon with Don Arden and Steve Russell. A&R man Steve Russell met the band members at the door with, "Come in, let's see what you got." As they walked into the room, they noticed multiple gold records of ELO leaning against the wall. Keith did most of the talking as he pitched the band's song, "We're Gonna Have A New World Champion". In the corner in semi darkness was Don Arden, listening to the conversation. Eventually Steve looked across at Don and got some kind of signal from him. Then Steve said, "We'll play it over the speaker system and if we get a reaction, we'll call you". The band thanked them, and off they went back up to Bradford, Yorkshire.
Two days later, the phone rang and Steve was asking Keith where the band was playing on a date given. Keith gave Steve the venue Meanwood Hotel, Leeds, near Yeadon Airport, and Steve came up that night to watch the band. "We're Gonna Have A New World Champion" had been previewed on Pennine Radio 235 as a new record release coming out soon, as well as BBC TV's Look North news programme. So when the song was played live at gigs, everyone knew the song and the crowds went crazy. Steve was impressed with the band, saw the reaction of people dancing on the tables, and signed the band up that night. The single was released on 17 May 1976 and published by Contemporary Music, Wimbledon.
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Though Richard Dunn didn't win the fight, he gave a very spirited performance and was welcomed back to Bradford with a homecoming full of cheering fans. He was the only Yorkshireman to ever fight for the heavyweight boxing championship of the world.
The band were made members of the Performing Rights Society in London, 1 July 1976, as well as the Mechanical Copyright Protection Society, 8 July 1976.
fill up early to see the show and it was a great success! Geoff was with the band about a year until they decided to go back to straight music.
It was time to think about a follow up to the first single. Since their first record was a world event, the band needed another one of importance to keep the momentum going. They did so by writing a song for the upcoming Silver Jubilee celebrations for Queen Elizabeth II, called "25 Years On". The idea of the song was prompted by a meeting with Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin, who happened to have a jubilee badge in his lapel at the Ivor Novello Academy Awards.
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Midnight Hearse were first invited to the awards, regarded as the Oscars of British music, in 1977 and continued to attend every year for nearly a decade.
The band decided to give "25 Years On" a Renaissance/Elizabethan flavour with crescendoing acoustic guitars at the beginning using a twelve-string and six-string to complete the effect. Trevor's cousin, Chris, had made Keith a wha-wha pedal that was absolutely mind-blowing, and he was invited to play six-string guitar on the song, with Keith playing twelve-string. The record was released in May 1977 on Mat records. It was broadcast on BBC TV's 'Look North' programme, Pennine Radio 235, and Radio Leeds. |
In May 1980, the band were at the Ivor Novello Academy Awards and Paul McCartney was one of the chief guests at the ceremony. Keith and Trevor approached him, handing him a tape of three songs and lyric sheets. Paul read the lyrics to one of the songs, "Stop! You're Breaking My Heart", and listened to part of the song. He said he would let them know about possible publication. They spoke for quite a while and then Paul turned to Keith and said, "These could be the big ones!"
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In 1981, the band released their third single, on the SRT label, called "Glory! Bradford City" to commemorate the football club's promotion to division 3. The record was engineered and produced by Bill Clark, and was their best selling single to date.
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In December 1981, the band met Terry Uttley of Smokie at the Crown pub, Horton Bank Top, Bradford for some Christmas drinks. Terry's dad and Trevor's dad were also there. They all had a good time and the band gave Terry a copy of their latest single before leaving.
On an earlier occasion, in the mid 70s, all members of Smokie showed up at the Hadden Hall pub, where Midnight Hearse was playing. After the show, Smokie invited the band to a party at a club and talked about old times. The beer was flowing freely.
The band went to Valley Parade Ground to see a match and were recognised by fans in the stand as the record was played over the speaker system. The program for the game had a photo of Charles I being conducted by the manager of the team, Roy McFarland.
Leeds United Football Club were impressed with "Glory! Bradford City" and contacted the band to write an anthem song for them. However, the band thanked them but turned them down out of loyalty to Bradford City.
Their songwriting abilities were such that some big names covered some of their songs, including Cliff Richard!
The band continued to play the clubs, pubs, and dance halls for the next three years, to the end of 1984.....
Their songwriting abilities were such that some big names covered some of their songs, including Cliff Richard!
The band continued to play the clubs, pubs, and dance halls for the next three years, to the end of 1984.....
In 2009, volume one of Bradford's Noise of the Valleys was published on the history of Bradford rock, which featured an excerpt on the band's influence on the Bradford rock scene through Midnight Hearse and then Charles I. The book reached number 1 in the Bradford Waterstone's book chart at Christmas that year, as well as selling
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copies in many countries, including the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Vietnam, Switzerland, Holland, France, Germany, and South Africa. Following this came a series of CDs, which included Midnight Hearse's "We're Gonna Have A New World Champion" on Bradford's Noise of the Valleys: The Missing Music 2 in 2013. The CD was reviewed by Record Collector magazine, a London publication and the longest running of its kind.
In that same year, Bradford City Football Club got to the League Cup Final at Wembley. This created a resurgence of interest in Charles I's "Glory! Bradford City" and the single was being shared and sold online in both CD and vinyl formats through various outlets, including Amazon worldwide, cdBBQ, and Vinyl Tap.
The 2014 Deer Shed Festival in Topcliffe, North Yorkshire featured Bradford's Noise of the Valleys authors Gary Cavanagh and Matt Webster in the Spoken Word tent, recalling the history of Bradford rock and pop and a band named Midnight Hearse.
As of 2018, Keith, John, and Trevor are writing some new songs for an upcoming album. |
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